Planet Earth: Finding Balance on the Blue Marble with Environmental Science Activities for Kids

The environment is all around us, whether you live in a city, suburb, or the country. Sometimes, it’s easy to ignore. But forgetting about the environment isn’t an option if we want our planet to be healthy!

Planet Earth: Finding Balance on the Blue Marble with Environmental Science Activities for Kids introduces middle grade readers to all the parts of the natural world, including the oceans, the atmosphere, the earth, and everything in between. In this book, kids master ecology basics, such as the food web and animal habitats, while also learning about environmental issues such as wind and solar power, endangered species, climate change, and more. Stories about new innovations in fields such as recycling, agriculture, and energy production galvanize readers to turn their creative thinking skills to their own inventions.

Planet Earth includes hands-on STEM activities and critical thinking exercises to encourage readers to discover connections among their observations of their immediate environment and the larger world around them. Fun facts, links to online primary sources and other supplemental material, and essential questions encourage readers to ask themselves what they could do differently to make the world a healthier place.

Planet Earth is part of a set of four Build It Environmental Science books that explore the history and science of the planet and all that live on it through hands-on STEM activities and real-life environmental connections. Other titles in this series are Biodiversity, Garbage, and Biomes.

Nomad Press books integrate content with participation. Common Core State Standards, the Next Generation Science Standards, and STEM Education all place project-based learning as key building blocks in education. Combining content with inquiry-based projects stimulates learning and makes it active and alive. Nomad’s unique approach simultaneously grounds kids in factual knowledge while allowing them the space to be curious, creative, and critical thinkers.

Kathleen Reilly has written several books for Nomad Press, including Explore Weather and Climate! with 25 Projects; and Natural Disasters: Investigate Earth's Most Destructive Forces with 25 Projects. She is an award-winning author of several other science books for kids and has contributed to dozens of publications, including Better Homes & Gardens, Family Circle, Family Fun, National Geographic Kids, and Parents. Kate lives in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Tom Casteel is an illustrator and cartoonist that graduated from the Center for Cartoon Studies in 2011. He has illustrated more than two dozen books for Nomad Press. He lives in South Bend, Indiana, with his family.